Sound 2000-2009

Echosystem, 2007Note: Work no longer exists due to storage requirements

Discarded P.E.T. plastic, audio, metal, dimensions variableWith a single swipe of the barcode, we give information about decisions we make —our purchases are scanned, ordered, classified and held in secrecy, until this consumer information ends up as a commodity itself. Echosystem is my echo as it pertains to economic activity—an object dependent on and within the society in which it is placed. The work is constructed from discarded plastic containers fastened by rivets. The sound component, recorded in situ in a checkout lane is comprised of a looped recording of a Loblaw’s checkout counter with the predominant audio of the scanner. Removed from the cacophony of the supermarket, the ping strikes an uncanny resemblance to the sound of a heart-rate monitor. The discarded sounds of the market place coincide with the textual formation of an ellipsis—(the things left out of text. What remains is the trace of sound a stand-in for the item purchased and the collection of data in the archive. This technology is mirrored in the scan of the compact disc unit placed in a black box at the “point of origin” where the digital code is translated into audible sounds. The handcrafted tin boxes are made from soup cans as a contrast to the cold, manufactured conduits that carry the sound to various destinations around the gallery space, echoing the hidden aspects of the technology and the process of data collection. They are intrusive mimicking the repetition and simulation of post- Fordist manufacturing.